This invention relates to a device for infeeding a strip of flexible material in machines for binding thin articles and, in particular, for edging parts for boots and shoes, such as soles, insoles and the like, the said machines comprising means for placing adhesive between the said strip and the articles to be edged, mechanism actuated by control means provided with a reciprocating motion, for cutting the said strip, mechanism for folding the said strip partly above and partly below the outline of the said articles, and pressure and transportation mechanism for intermittently pressing the strip against the articles and for causing the said articles to be moved forward as they arrive.
At the present time, to infeed the strip in binding machines, a device (described in Patent Application No. 20529 A/71 deposited on 13.2. 1971 in the name of the same applicants as herein) is used and provision is made in this for the strip to pass through a pair of rollers, one of which is turned (via a rack and freely disengaged gear system) by the reciprocating motion of the rod that operates the strip cutting mechanism, so that the said strip is made to move forward after each cutting operation.
The device is, however, somewhat complicated and operationally unreliable because of the possibility the strip has of sliding out of position and of imperfections occurring during machining.
Furthermore, a certain difficulty is experienced with the aforementioned device in inserting the strip between the pair of rollers in phase with the starting up of the binding machine, and this results in time being wasted and in production costs becoming greater.